Tentacle-Free Anime: "Alien Nine" (2001) Review

I love me some psychological stories. And sometimes, if I'm lucky, they appear in the oddest of places, where I least expect them. But the psychological aspect has to be done right - it can't just be a lot of mind effery, it has to serve a purpose to the characters, and it has to entertain. Finally, it has to make me feel. So with that in mind, let's discuss Alien Nine.

Summary:Otani Yuri, much to her disgust, has been elected by her class for alien fighting duty. Together with Tonime Kasumi, who joined as an alien fighter simply for the sake of doing so, and Kawamura Kumi, who became and alien fighter to avoid the responsibility of yet another year of class presidency, she must defend her school from periodic alien attacks. Introspection, fear, anxiety and friendship await Yuri as she is forced to stare life itself in the mouth in her chaotic coming of age.[AnimeNewsNetwork.com]

Let’s start with the elephant in the room: look at the style in which the characters are conveyed, and try to match that up with my talk of psychological stories and the summary itself. None of it adds up, does it? Exactly. This makes Alien Nine, once you've seen it, one of the unsung gems of the anime realm. At least from an aesthetic viewpoint. Almost as if on purpose, the art style is something that those looking for a bad ass show are not going to think twice about, and those looking for something cutesy are going to be completely blindsided by what they find. It's a reverse effect, and it's going to get people talking one way or another.

Promo image

These are little, cutesy, moe girls who are anything but in these four episodes about fighting aliens, it's really as simple as that.

Yuri is a young 6th grader who doesn't want to fight these things, and is very much afraid of dying, so much so that almost every episode sees her crying and going through PTSD like she just went 3 terms in Vietnam, Kasumi is a prodigy who goes around acting carefree and completely innocent while hiding a terrible loneliness, and Kumi is a girl who's been forced to grow up too fast and is taking no shit from anyone or anything, and is constantly having to put Yuri in her place and force her to woman up each episode.

Looking at it now, it's our main character, Yuri, who exists as the weakest link when watching this show.

Many people complain about Shinji Ikari in Neon Genesis Evangelion for his continuous whining and bitching about not wanting to pilot the Eva and fight the Angels. Well, Yuri is basically Shinji in a 6th grade girl's body. To be honest, it isn't pretty, but it's also developed rather well in my opinion at least in the short amount of time that's given to her character and the world surrounding her.

Our Alien Fighters Kasumi Kumi and Yuri.

She was elected by her class to fight the aliens against her wishes, everyone around her who doesn't have to fight see it as a great honor and is forcing her to do it, and each time she brings up the idea of quitting she's flat out told no, she HAS to risk her life for her school as it is her solemn duty. Like Shinji, I feel she has a lot of valid reasons to be upset. That being said, the sheer amount of crying she does in these four episodes is pretty heavy-handed and gets annoying rather quickly.

The other girls are fresh additions though, and I like that each one was given dimension and depth rather than be kept bland and predictable. While Yuri more or less stays the same through these four episodes, Kumi and Kasumi change a lot and Kasumi even is made to be a huge part to how the story ends which really surprised me.

Their instructor, as well, is a big question mark and one of the big mysteries of the show that I wish had been answered by the end, but alas, one of the biggest issues this series faces is that at four episodes, it isn't a complete story. They needed at least one or two more episodes to tell everything they obviously wanted to tell, but in the end we only get what we get. This is not to say Alien Nine isn't satisfactory, for what it is I do believe it is a really good series, but it needed to finish. There is a way to finish it, but you have to read the manga. The manga isn't very long at all, only 37 chapters, but it's still rather sad that they didn't finish it in the anime.

The feeling of protection is a big part of this series.

The aliens themselves help give this show even more interesting, darker subject matter. In this world, aliens are such a common thing that when they land on school grounds, 2-3 Alien Fighters in basic helmets, pads, and roller skates elected from the student body usually tend to be enough to stop them. And people “panic,” but they're ultimately accepted as a part of everyday life. No military is called in, just the awkwardly trained Alien Fighter team. I find this to be fascinating, but it doesn't make the aliens any less unsettling. Did I mention those helmets they wear are symbiotic aliens themselves called Borgs, who use the emotions of the girls to fight and protect them if needed?

The girls are tasked with bringing each alien in alive, but, thanks to Yuri's constant fear, more often than not the aliens are killed in rather gruesome ways by the Borgs. I like how the aliens look as well, they look like mutated amphibious creatures and this is one thing I always believed the Japanese get awfully right: they make aliens look alien. They make them unique, and they make them a threat. I've seen this time and again in numerous anime, and Alien Nine just helps reiterate that feeling.

Like I mentioned earlier, this series is actually full of psychological warfare, as these girls go through a helluva lot. Episode 2, for example, comes to mind and stands out to me as the darkest and most violent episode of the series. I won't spoil why, but a lot of bad crud goes down in that episode and I felt so, so bad for the girls during the entirety of it. Especially Yuri, even though she's kind of annoying, episode 2 sort of drives home exactly why I feel she's justified in her actions at least to some extent.

I also really like the design of the Borgs a lot, I want a helmet or hat in real life in the style of one. Their attacks are really unique, in that they use spikes coming out of their wings to attack, and can send those spikes flying in all sorts of endless directions to both attack and defend. The animators on this series have a lot of fun with the way these spikes can move, and they do a lot of really cool and unique things with them that make the alien fighting to be really fun experience, at least when no one is getting overly hurt.

The Borgs

The way the Borgs are symbiotic as well is rather interesting, the species remains a mystery to us throughout the series, but they live off human waste, such as sweat, as their most lively way of feeding. So after each battle, the Borgs feed on the girls sweat in order to get their strength back. That being said, one thing this story doesn't do during these moments of sweat feasting is they don't make a big deal out of it, and four whole episodes go by without any sort of fan service that a viewer would find titillating even happening. It's rather refreshing.Alien Nine is a story filled with psychological warfare, really unique looking aliens, intriguing mysteries and violent battles that all help shape who Yuri, Kasumi, and Kumi are. It also comes from a time in the late 90s/early 00s when Japan was really experimenting with anime and getting to see what stuck, I wish darker series like this had won out, but most days anymore all you get is ecchi moe reminiscent of Love Hina and Tenchi Muyo (also good series in their own right, and ones I'll touch on someday).

And while unfinished, I do believe this anime to be good, and something anyone looking for a well-written, mature story should seek out. Don't let the cute aesthetic fool you, this series is anything but. It's also very short at four episodes, so you can easily knock it out in like two hours; and you'll have the satisfaction of having seen an anime that I feel isn't really that well known in the community, and is thus a hidden gem.

So go check out Alien Nine, and then I'd say go read the manga. The anime really is a unique experience.